


Minyards' Magical Mischief

by moonix



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: AU where the Twinyards own a Weasley twin style joke shop, Alternate Universe – Harry Potter AU, Andrew is the useless gay twin, But mostly it’s soft n fluffy, First Dates, Hot Chocolate, Kevin gets pranked a lot, Kissing, M/M, Magic, Magical ice-cream, Neil and Kevin are Aurors, Pining, There’s a little bit of murder, Wee bit of smut, Wholesome Twinyards, sweets, twinyards
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-02
Updated: 2018-11-02
Packaged: 2019-08-14 15:37:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,159
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16495481
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonix/pseuds/moonix
Summary: “No,” Aaron said. “Andrew, no.”They locked eyes, and for a moment it was like they were eleven again, catching sight of each other for the first time across a crowded train platform.“I confess,” Andrew said tonelessly, “to the murder of Drake Spear.”(Or: an Auror and a murderer walk into an ice-cream parlour.)





	Minyards' Magical Mischief

**Author's Note:**

  * For [alexjosten](https://archiveofourown.org/users/alexjosten/gifts).



> Yep, it's me again, back at it with the Harry Potter AUs! This one goes out to my friend Alex, who had a birthday this week and is feeling under the weather <3
> 
> Warnings: some angst about Drake and mentions of past abuse, but nothing explicit and nothing in the timeline of the fic.

The bell above the door of Minyards’ Magical Mischief had been malfunctioning all day.

Or maybe it was deliberate, the way most things were deliberate at a joke shop. Robin had a particularly angelic look about her today that usually meant she was up to something. Another customer entered, and the bell sang out a truly terrible rendition of All Ye Merry Hippogriffs with the lyrics changed to fit a somewhat Halloween-y theme.

Andrew pretended to be busy behind the counter, studiously avoiding eye contact with the customer. Unfortunately for him Robin was in the back dealing with a rogue Skiving Snackbox and Aaron was in full swing across the room, delivering his speech about why they didn’t sell love potions to a gaggle of very embarrassed teenage girls.

Merlin, Andrew hated the customers. They should have just stuck with their owl-order business. Things had been quiet then, in the early days of Minyards’ Magical Mischief, if you forgot about the owls and the horrific mess they’d made. Having a workshop separate from their sleeping quarters was a definite improvement, though.

The morning went by in a haze. The sky outside was bristling with rain and a sharp wind kept sneaking in whenever the door opened, accompanied by various off-key songs and rude noises courtesy of the wayward bell. There were only two minor explosions to be dealt with, and Aaron lost some of his bad humour after the romantically inclined teenage girls finally left with several boxes of daydream charms and the bell mimicked their high-pitched giggles perfectly.

“They make me sick,” he muttered, slumping over the counter with a yawn. “It’s like they’ve never heard of consent. Or the _law_ , for that matter. It’s fucking illegal to sell or use Amortentia for anything but educational or research purposes, why does no one ever know this?”

“People are dumb,” Andrew offered, sorting through a box of colour-changing rainbow ink. Next to him, Aaron straightened up.

“Look who it is,” he murmured and swiftly pinched Andrew’s wand out of his sleeve to zap a quick fabric-straightening charm at Andrew’s creased robes. “You’re a mess today, by the way.”

“Didn’t ask,” Andrew grumbled and snatched his wand back. He dared a glance at the door, and sure enough, Neil Josten was pushing his way inside out of the rain.

The bell let out a long, wistful sigh.

Neil grinned when he saw the twins behind the counter and held up his offering of four cups of hot chocolate. He had two of his and Aaron’s usual order – dark hot chocolate with peppermint syrup, whipped cream and a peppermint toad sitting amid crushed mint humbugs on top of the abomination, which Andrew eyed with distaste. The chai-spiced hot chocolate he floated over to Robin, who trilled out her thanks. For Andrew, Neil had picked a sweeter concoction with toffee, marshmallows and chocolate frogs.

“I left Kevin at Quality Quidditch Supplies, I reckon we’ve got half an hour at least until he realises I’m not there anymore,” Neil told them, shaking the rain from his hair. He wasn’t wearing his Auror robes—again—and was instead wearing one of Bee’s knitted jumpers, a muted green wool with a big navy N on the front. Bee had made many such jumpers for the twins, even though Andrew kept telling her there was no point since they both had the same initial, and Robin was wearing hers today as well. She waved at Neil from where she was wrangling a window display of self-carving pumpkins that had collectively decided to only spell swearwords this morning.

“No dark wizards to hunt today?” Andrew drawled, licking caramel sauce off his upper lip.

“Not really,” Neil said, a flash of something troubled crossing his face like the shadow of a cloud passing overhead. “We’re investigating a missing person case, but there’s been no leads so far. He’s simply vanished.”

Aaron’s eyes flickered briefly to Andrew and he prompted, “Oh?”

“Well,” Neil said, gazing around himself to make sure no one was within earshot and leaning closer over the counter. He smelled like rain and peppermint, and he still had a stubborn pillow crease on his cheek. “I’m not supposed to talk about it, but he wasn’t exactly a model citizen. The way I see it, the best case scenario is he’s Splinched himself horribly and died a slow death somewhere in a ditch. Don’t tell Kevin I said that.”

“One can hope,” Aaron said dryly, and Neil toasted him with his hot chocolate.

“So what have you two been up to?” Neil asked after Aaron had directed a customer to the fireworks in the back. There was a small residue of chocolate in the corner of his mouth, and Andrew found himself too distracted by it to answer.

“Oh, just business as usual,” Aaron came to his aid. “Andrew successfully avoided any and all customer interaction, managed to completely fuck up my filing system in the span of five minutes, and dropped a weather bottle and made it snow all over the Muggle magic tricks.”

“Well, he _is_ the useless gay twin,” Neil said with a little what-can-you-do shrug.

“He’s _so_ useless,” Aaron agreed mournfully. “Did you know he can’t even fly a broom?”

Neil gasped dramatically and nearly spilled his hot chocolate all over the counter.

“You can’t _fly_? How? Why?”

“I’m too fat,” Andrew said deadpan. Aaron snorted hot chocolate through his nose and groaned.

“Wow,” Neil scoffed, “first of all, that’s not how brooms work, weight doesn’t factor into it at all. Second, you’re about the same weight as Aaron, and _he_ can fly.”

“I’m the older twin, so I’m heavier,” Andrew said. “It’s a twin thing, you wouldn’t understand.”

“Must be because you’re so full of shit,” Aaron muttered.

Neil shook his head, still looking shocked.

“This is appalling, I am appalled. First thing on my next day off I’m going to teach you how to ride a broomstick,” he promised.

“A Nimbus is not the kind of broomstick he wants to be riding,” Aaron said and let out a wheezy croak as Andrew stomped hard on his foot. “Right, I think the gentleman over there needs my help with the fireworks.”

He hastily drained his hot chocolate and limped to the back with a fake customer service smile plastered on his face. Neil frowned at the sad remains of whipped cream in his mug.

“If you don’t like the new Nimbus, I’ve got an old Shooting Star stashed away somewhere. Matt and Dan’s kids sometimes use it, solid broom to learn the basics really.”

Andrew resisted the urge to bite a chunk out of his mug in frustration. He could never tell if Neil genuinely didn’t understand Aaron’s increasingly obvious hints or if he was just messing with Andrew. Most likely he purposefully misunderstood them in order to spare everyone the awkwardness of the truth, which was that Andrew was miserably, hopelessly stuck in the quagmire of wanting Neil, but Neil didn’t want him back.

“You look like someone spilled Peruvian instant darkness powder on you, by the way,” Neil said, eyes crinkling at the corners. “I didn’t think it’d be possible to find an even darker shade of black than what you usually wear, but you pulled it off.”

Andrew tugged at his robes, which had gone back to creased after Aaron’s straightening charm had worn off. He was also, he noticed, wearing them inside-out, but there was nothing he could do about that now except pretend it had been on purpose.

“How long do you look for a missing person before the case is closed?”

Neil blinked and tapped his finger against his mug as he thought.

“Depends on the case,” he said. “I’m sure Kevin could recite the exact paragraph of the Auror handbook dealing with missing persons, but I usually just follow my gut instinct. It’s up to Wymack to make the final decision anyway. Kevin would draw it out forever if he could, he hates unsolved cases. Speak of the devil…”

The bell above the door belted out a crude Quidditch anthem, and Andrew didn’t even have to look up to see who it was. Kevin strode straight to the counter with a mutinous expression on his face, and Neil shot Andrew a pained look.

“…can’t believe you just up and left without notifying me, we’re supposed to be partners, I had to interview the suspect on my own, do you even know against how many regulations that is?”

“Don’t get your knickers in a twist, I just took my lunch break a little early,” Neil shrugged. “And he wasn’t a suspect. Did you find out anything interesting?”

“No,” Kevin huffed, “he was utterly useless. I still need to document it, but _someone_ took my last quill.”

Andrew handed him one of the black quills from under the counter and Kevin took it without thinking, scribbling away on his notepad. Neil, who had clearly expected something to happen, looked confused for a moment, but it only took a few more minutes before Kevin was finished with his pointless notes and stared at the page in dawning horror.

“Wow, Kev,” Neil drawled, leaning over him to peer at the notepad. “Your handwriting’s got completely illegible. Maybe you should sit in on one of Matt’s pre-school classes and re-learn how to use a quill, hm? But don’t worry, no one ever reads your reports anyway.”

He patted Kevin’s shoulder and winked at Andrew, who tucked the prank quill away with a straight face. He and Aaron were both blessed with infallible poker faces, which was one of the main reasons why they’d always got out of trouble at school. That and their good grades and Aaron’s impeccable impression of a stressed student on his way to the library to cram for the next exam. The truth was that neither of them had put in much effort for their grades, thanks to a crafty combination of Andrew’s above-average memory, Aaron’s unrivalled skills with flashcards, and a certain knack for semi-legal charms. They’d used the time to experiment and develop their products instead, and if they left school with a bang after their OWLs just to make a point, well, there was a reason why a certain fourth-floor corridor still had a bit of magical swamp left with their names on it.

Kevin sighed, still squinting at his mangled notes, and picked up his wand which he’d unwisely deposited on the counter. At once, it turned into a live bat in his hand and fluttered off, smacking his face in the process.

“Oh for Merlin’s sake, Minyard! Where’s my wand?”

Andrew pointed casually at the bat that was still zooming around the shop.

“Come on, I know you took it,” Kevin growled. “Give it back, I need it for work.”

“Ah yes, to find a missing rapist and paedophile,” Andrew said. “Very important stuff.”

“How do you even—oh, of course Neil told you, fucking hell. Neil, we need to talk about who you share information with. And Andrew, have you considered that this guy might be out there attacking people as we speak? We have to find him so we can lock him up safely in Azkaban where he belongs. My wand, if you please.”

Andrew merely shrugged.

“Maybe it’s in your pocket.”

“It’s not in my pocket,” Kevin snapped.

“Have you checked?”

“No, I…” He shot Andrew a death glare and patted down the pockets of his Auror robe, coming up with a long, slim wand. “Oh, very mature. Very well then, we have to get going. Some of us have important jobs that actually make a difference in society, not that you’d know about that.”

He stomped off to the door and the bell cackled loudly as he left. Andrew pulled out Kevin’s actual wand and handed it to Neil, but Neil pocketed it without even a tiny conspiratorial smirk.

“I never told you that,” he said, blue eyes sharp like peppermint as they watched Andrew’s face for a reaction. “What he’d done, the guy we’re looking for. How did you know that he’s a rapist?”

“Saw it in my crystal ball,” Andrew deadpanned.

“I’ll hold you to that,” Neil said, still staring at him with that unnervingly intense gaze. Andrew clamped down on the urge to say something pathetic like, “I’m looking forward to it,” and merely pushed the empty hot chocolate cups at Neil to take back with him.

*

Andrew stared down at the mixture in front of him and sighed. The consistency was perfect now, it did what it was supposed to when he tested it and the smell was pleasantly woodsy, but for some reason it was still stubbornly, violently pink.

“Are you still faffing about with that broom polish?” Aaron asked, squinting at him over the top of his glasses. They were steamed up from the potion he was making and his hair had curled from a burst of humid air and then dried in unruly clumps on his head. It was late, way past midnight, and the fire had burned down almost completely.

“No,” Andrew said, poking at the contents of the tin.

“Let me borrow your wand for a moment,” Aaron muttered, frowning at his cauldron. “I need to check the temperature on this.”

“Go home,” Andrew told his brother and nodded at the cauldron. “I can finish that.”

“Yeah? And when will you go to bed?” Aaron asked exasperatedly.

“When it’s finished,” Andrew said, rolling his eyes. “Isn’t your wife waiting up for you at home?”

“Katelyn’s got a late shift at St. Mungo’s. When was the last time you slept?”

Andrew’s eye twitched and he pressed his thumb down over it, willing it to stay still. It wasn’t that he hadn’t slept at all since—well. It had just been very sparse, fitful sleep; swinging wildly between nightmares and insomnia to the point where Andrew had to leave the house and walk up and down Diagon Alley in his pyjamas until he could tell what was real and what wasn’t again.

Sometimes he took out Bee’s old map and watched the little dot labelled Betsy Dobson putter about in her office at Hogwarts. He’d been planning to visit her on the next Hogsmeade weekend, for a Butterbeer at the Three Broomsticks and their customary trip to Honeydukes, but now he wasn’t so sure. Hogwarts was an assault of memories, both good and bad, and Andrew felt paper-thin and frayed at the moment, one tripping jinx away from plunging headfirst into relapse.

He forced himself to concentrate on the tin of broomstick polish in front of him and carefully folded another charm into the paste. It finally turned a translucent rose gold, and he held it up and tilted it to the light, satisfied with the result.

He screwed the lid on and spelled one of their generic black and gold Minyards’ Magical Mischief labels on it, too tired to come up with a proper name for it just yet.

“I’m going to bed,” he told Aaron. “Lock the door when you go.”

“Here,” Aaron said, throwing a small vial at him that Andrew caught out of reflex. “Take some Dreamless Sleep. You need to rest.”

“And you’re not supposed to have this,” Andrew pointed out. Aaron rolled his eyes.

“I know, I know, but you needed it and I’m not going to get addicted just from having the bottle in my pocket for a couple of hours. Now piss off, I need to decant this and then I’m going home.”

Andrew took the Dreamless Sleep upstairs with him to the little apartment that was tucked away above the shop. It had slanted ceilings and a tiny bathroom and kitchenette, with a kettle that whistled blue steam when you left it for too long. There was a bay window that looked out over Diagon Alley’s gabled rooftops and cobbled streets, and one wall was almost entirely taken up by a large aquarium. Andrew fed the fish, made himself a cup of Bee’s chamomile tea with honey and tucked himself onto the windowsill with a blanket, watching the progress of an owl between the streetlamps outside.

He turned the potion vial over and over in his hands, rubbing his thumb over the stopper. He’d never told Aaron that Dreamless Sleep didn’t work on him. Over the years, he’d experimented with different variations of it and tested them on himself, but nothing had any effect. He and Bee had tried to find ways to use a Pensieve for when the memories became too much, but Pensieves were rare and extremely expensive.

Once, in his second year at Hogwarts, Andrew had asked her why he couldn’t just have a timeturner to go back and kill everyone who’d hurt him and Aaron.

Now, more than a decade later, he thought of Tilda, overdosing on potions on the Hemmicks’ fancy silk settee at number twelve, Grimmauld Place. Of the green flash of an Avada Kedavra, sickly and poisonous, still seared to the insides of his eyelids like a permanent sticking charm. He chuckled to himself even as his grip turned white-knuckled on his mug.

“Oh, Bee,” he murmured, leaning his face against the cool glass of the window. “If only you knew.”

He fell asleep on the window seat and woke up in the early hours of the morning with a crick in his neck and grit in his eyes. It was raining again, delicate grey sheets of it, like old tulle. Andrew stretched and winced at the various pains that popped up. He hobbled to the bathroom on stiff legs, then had some coffee and toast before venturing down to the shop to prepare for opening.

He found Neil loitering outside the door, shoulders hunched against the rain. He was wearing the dragonhide jacket that was part of the Auror uniform for colder days, the collar popped up and half the straps undone, and he produced a bag of piping hot pastries once Andrew let him inside.

“Delicious,” said the traitorous bell above the door. “Finally, some good fucking food.”

Andrew really had to talk to Robin about what on earth she’d done with that bell.

“Sorry to bug you so early,” Neil said, not sounding sorry at all. “Can we talk?”

Andrew made a “go on” gesture and led him through to the workshop, where he put the kettle on for tea and found two chipped plates for the pastries. The tin of broom polish still sat on the table, so he grabbed it and shoved it at Neil.

“What’s that?”

“Broom polish,” Andrew said, glad that Aaron wasn’t here yet to spin it into another innuendo.

“For me?” Neil asked, puzzled. In true Neil fashion, he’d already unscrewed the lid and stuck his nose in to smell it, and the moany little sound that escaped him shivered and tingled down Andrew’s spine like wet-starting fireworks. “It smells so good.”

“Helps with the callouses,” Andrew muttered, hiding behind his pastry. Neil was always complaining about the rough handle of his new broom, and his hands got chapped and sore in the winter from long stake-outs at work.

“You’re amazing, you know that?” Neil smiled. Then the expression faded and something serious took its place, like pavement being darkened by raindrops. “So, we found something. I had to talk to you before Kevin gets here, because I know he’s just going to be his usual insensitive self and you don’t deserve that.”

“Spit it out, Josten,” Andrew said, though he couldn’t really swallow the next bite of pastry anymore. The kettle started whistling and he flicked his wand at it to shut it up.

“Kevin thinks we should talk to Spear’s potential former victims,” Neil said. “Starting with his foster siblings. Imagine our surprise when it turned out we’d already spoken to one.”

“So?” Andrew gritted out.

“So, I’m guessing that’s how you knew what he’d done. What I can’t figure out is this: how did you know Spear was the missing person when I hadn’t even mentioned his name?”

“Maybe you did mention it and you just forgot.”

“No,” Neil shook his head, “no, I’m sure. I may not be the shining example of professionalism that Kevin wants me to be, but I do care about keeping my job.”

Andrew busied himself with the kettle and two mugs, careful not to grab one of the nose-biting teacups from the workbench by accident. He poured the tea, stirred milk and sugar into his and a squeeze of lemon into Neil’s and handed it over with steady hands.

“Well? Are you professional enough to arrest me if I confess to the murder of Drake Spear?”

Neil stared at him, frozen over his cup of tea. Andrew stared back. He wanted to say Neil’s name, to scrape the mouldy residue left behind by Drake’s off his tongue, but Neil was too good, too cherished to be used as a cleaning agent like this. Andrew took a sip of his scalding hot tea instead.

“Did you?” Neil asked.

“Did I?” Andrew parroted back. “You’re the Auror, you tell me.”

Neil let out a frustrated huff and started to pace around the workshop. He picked up a few things at random, as if expecting to find the murder weapon stuck between a pile of invoices or buried in the box of half-finished Extendable Ears. Half the Auror department unofficially used them for stake-outs—Wymack usually turned a blind eye, because getting a new gadget approved by Health and Safety often took years, and the Extendable Ears boosted results.

There was a clatter and then Aaron called out from the front room. Andrew remained where he was, stuck to the spot while Neil continued to pace around him. Aaron faltered in his steps when he saw them, still in his coat and the ridiculous woolly bobble hat that Bee had knitted him for Christmas last year.

“Everything alright?” he asked, eyes flitting between Andrew and Neil in his Auror jacket.

“Yes,” Andrew told him. “We’re out of Nosebleed Nougat, though.”

“No, we’re not, there’s some in the back,” Aaron said. Andrew willed him to leave and check, just to prove that he was right, but Aaron stayed firmly where he was.

“If you confess,” Neil said absently, poking at the dried remnants of broom polish on the table, “and plead self-defence, you might not even go to Azkaban. I know a good lawyer, if I ask nicely she’ll take your case. There’ll be a trial at some point, of course, but there’s a lot of evidence already piled up against Spear, your chances would be good…”

“No,” Aaron said. “Andrew, no.”

They locked eyes, and for a moment it was like they were eleven again, catching sight of each other for the first time across a crowded train platform.

“I confess,” Andrew said tonelessly, “to the murder of Drake Spear.”

*

Kevin and Neil weren’t the Aurors who interrogated him, but Andrew had expected that. He knew they were probably watching from behind the mirrored glass, and the thought of Neil’s safe, steady, candy-blue eyes on him was the only thing that kept him going at times, kept him wading through the ugly, stinking morass of his past and dredge it all up for everyone to see.

Wilds, Kevin and Neil’s superior and Wymack’s second-in-command, let him speak and didn’t bat an eye at any of it. She asked the occasional question and managed to keep on track for most of the ordeal. Reynolds, the lawyer Neil had promised him, breezed in barely five minutes after they’d started, wearing deathly high-heeled dragonhide boots and nodding briskly at Wilds and her partner.

Andrew calmly recounted a story of Drake attacking him on the way home from Aaron’s house last week. He described pulling his wand on him and casting the killing curse, went through the process of how he’d dispatched the body and told them where to find the remains if they were lucky. It was a true story, apart from a few minor details.

The interrogation took most of the day, with breaks and time for Andrew to talk things over with Reynolds, who handled his case with a detached confidence and wry humour that was surprisingly refreshing. She brought him a cup of actually decent coffee and a tiny packet of caramel and chocolate biscuits when Andrew was on the verge of flagging, a fancy French brand that only one person in the whole Ministry of Magic knew Andrew liked.

He tried not to wonder what that one person thought of him now, after hearing about all the ways Andrew was damaged and ruined and tainted beyond repair.

_An Auror and a murderer walk into a bar_ , he thought bitterly to himself as he nibbled on his last biscuit, but he was too drained to come up with a good ending to the joke.

“Don’t worry,” Reynolds said, “you won’t see a single day in Azkaban if I have any say about it. You’ll be out on parole until the trial, and then you’ll be a free man again in no time.”

Andrew didn’t waste breath to tell her that he wasn’t worried. It was no use to worry about Azkaban when his fate hadn’t even been decided yet. And even if they sent him there, Andrew wasn’t afraid of the Dementors—he fought his own personal Dementors every day just to get out of bed—and the shop would be in good hands with Aaron and Robin, who’d hopefully remember to feed his fish.

Reynolds kept her word though, and they let him go late that evening. Andrew felt tired down to the aching marrow of his bones and shaky with exhaustion. He peered at the visitors’ fireplaces and tried to force down the nausea at the idea of Flooing home, but he was in no state to Apparate on his own.

“Hey,” someone said softly behind him. “Need a Side-Along?”

Andrew closed his eyes and let Neil take him home.

*

Aaron, Robin and Bee were clustered around his fireplace. The latter had been in the process of nodding off, an empty cup of tea in her hand, while Robin and Aaron had clearly been trying to keep themselves awake with a game of Exploding Snap. One of Robin’s cards emitted a spray of sparks and a small cloud of smoke when Neil and Andrew appeared in the middle of the living room, and Bee startled awake with a small gasp.

“Shit,” Aaron said, “fuck, holy shit.”

“Oh, thank goodness,” Bee sighed, blinking sleep from her eyes.

“Hi Neil,” Robin chirped from where she was sprawled out on the floor. “Nice jacket. Suits you.”

“They let you go?” Aaron asked. Andrew didn’t have the energy to do much more than nod, and he let Neil relay the conditions of his parole to the others while he went to the bathroom to wash off the sweat and grime of the day. When he came back, Bee was heating up leftovers in the kitchenette for him and Aaron was wrangling Robin into the fireplace to Floo home.

“I should head off, too,” Neil said shyly. “I’m glad you’re home.”

Andrew tried to unstick his tongue from the roof of his mouth but only managed a pathetic little grunt. Bee caught hold of Neil before he could Disapparate and forced several containers of food on him, and Andrew wondered if she’d been here all day, cooking up a storm.

“That’s enough now, mum,” Aaron teased her. Calling her mum had started out as a joke, but the older the twins got, the less they meant it as one these days. Bee was the closest thing they had to a mother, Tilda and twelve shitty foster families aside, and she bore it with good grace.

“Seriously, I’ll be eating this all week,” Neil told her. “Thanks for coming, though. Sorry I scared you with that Firecall earlier. I was worried about these two, but now I know they’re in good hands.”

“Of course,” Bee agreed. “Now off with you, it’s bedtime for all of you little rascals.”

Neil tipped Andrew a tiny smile before Disapparating with his hoard of food. The second he was gone, Aaron rounded on Andrew.

“You fucking _idiot_! I can’t believe you! A pretty boy flutters his eyelashes at you and you confess to murder, seriously, we had a deal, they’d never have found enough evidence—”

“Aaron,” Bee said sharply.

“Well, it’s true,” Aaron sulked.

“Andrew did the right thing in turning himself in and clearing up the case,” Bee said, looking at Andrew. “You were very brave, Andrew. I am proud of you.”

“Didn’t you hear? I killed a man,” Andrew said, his voice raspy from all the talking he’d done today.

Aaron stared hard at the floor. Bee still looked at Andrew like she was proud, but also sad.

“I think it would be best if we all went to bed now,” she suggested, waving her wand at the sofa to turn it into a bed. Aaron had his own room next to Andrew’s, and they all took turns in the minuscule bathroom to get ready.

“Did you feed the fish?” Andrew asked Aaron as they passed in the doorway.

“Robin did,” Aaron said. Andrew was about to go but Aaron reached out and snagged the fabric of his hood. “I… thanks,” he mumbled awkwardly.

“Don’t tell Bee,” Andrew murmured, conscious of the clatter and humming coming from where Bee was doing the dishes in the kitchen. Aaron looked like he wanted to protest, but Andrew left him to his guilt and went to bed.

*

The bell above the door sang A Cauldron Full Of Hot, Strong Love when Neil entered. It was a Saturday, which meant that Neil was off-duty, which usually meant he rocked up in full flying gear just to show off.

Andrew hated Saturdays.

Today was worse. Neil was dressed in a pair of soft grey sweatpants that left little to the imagination, another one of Bee’s jumpers – this one with a little golden Snitch zooming around the front – and a Muggle leather jacket. Andrew, who had spent most of the past night in the clutch of nightmares stirred up by the interrogation, didn’t have the energy to pretend he wasn’t looking.

“Morning,” Neil said, plonking today’s offerings down on the counter. Aaron and Robin were both busy with customers and the shop was bustling with people, but somehow Andrew felt like he was wearing a bubble-head charm that extended over him and Neil and shut them off from the outside world.

Neil floated Aaron’s and Robin’s orders over to them and pushed one of the remaining cups at Andrew, who quickly finished ringing up a customer before taking a sip. He coughed in surprise—the drink had just enough Firewhisky to make Andrew’s insides feel like a toasty bonfire.

“Pumpkin spice and almond syrup,” Neil said. “Sounded very seasonal. Do you like it?”

Instead of replying Andrew emptied half of the mug in one go and Neil laughed.

“Taking that as a yes. Fortescue’s has a new range of ice-cream flavours, have you seen? They’ve got different charms mixed in, like you can get a scoop of chocolate with a cheering charm if you need a pick-me-up, or a scoop of ginger that will literally make your tongue tingle, stuff like that. Could be interesting.”

“Mm,” Andrew agreed, the warmth of the hot chocolate slowly loosening his tongue from the stiff curl it had been in all morning. His throat still felt sore and his head was pounding, but none of that seemed to matter now that Neil was here.

“Would you like to go and try some? In your lunch break?” Neil asked. He had cream on his upper lip and a leaf stuck in his hair, and he was bouncing on the balls of his feet like a nervous schoolboy.

Or maybe that was just Andrew’s heart.

“With you?” Andrew asked, and had to bend down behind the counter to pick up a few coins he’d dropped. He shoved a handful of change at the customer, not caring if it was too much, and slammed the till shut with a bang.

“Yes,” Neil grinned, still with cream on his lip. “If you want.”

Andrew did want.

He got swept up in another rush of customers but Neil stuck around, wandering the aisles and checking out the newest displays. He bought a few of the joke quills and wands to sneak to Kevin, some sweets that were filled with mustard and hot sauce to give to particularly annoying colleagues, and one of the self-carving pumpkins with a Snitch design because he was a Quidditch junkie and an idiot who was willing to spend money on an overpriced gimmick that used a basic charm found in any old textbook.

“Should I get Allison a Pygmy Puff?” Neil wondered, poking his fingers into the basket of purring fur balls. “I owe her for getting you out of Azkaban.”

He picked up a violently pink one and it squeaked happily at him. Neil dropped some more coins on the counter and nestled the Pygmy Puff in the crook of his neck, where it hummed and vibrated. Andrew bagged up his other purchases, added a card with information on how to care for a Pygmy Puff, and signalled to Aaron that he was taking his lunch break. Aaron just nodded vaguely, looking very flustered by the elderly lady in his care, who seemed to keep complimenting his hair.

“Are we leaving, then?” Neil asked, gently stroking the Pygmy Puff before safely tucking it away in his pocket. “Okay, cool. I can just shrink those down you know, you don’t have to carry them for me.”

Andrew awkwardly held on to Neil’s bags. It was sunny outside, but dark clouds were stitched into the seam of the sky and a strong wind was blowing through the cobbled streets. Andrew had to lean all his weight against it until they reached Fortescue’s, where they joined a long queue of people clamouring to try the new ice-cream flavours. The cheery chocolate seemed to be a favourite, though there were others that looked intriguing as well. Neil went for a pumpkin juice sorbet that was supposed to give courage and the gingersnap ice-cream with the tongue-tickle charm. Andrew got vanilla with miniature chocolate frogs that hopped around your mouth and stomach, a Butterbeer-flavoured concoction that frothed and turned to warm toffee on your tongue, and a rainbow-coloured Bertie Bott’s ice-cream where every spoonful had a different flavour.

“Next time I’m gonna try the Felix Felicis one,” Neil said, eyeing the light golden ice-cream that was selling like crazy. It allegedly had enough of the lucky potion in it to provide one with five minutes of luck after eating it, and a single scoop of it cost an entire Galleon.

“Why?” Andrew asked, biting down on a chocolate frog. “The most that will happen in those five minutes is you finding a Galleon on the street to replace the one you spent on the ice-cream.”

Neil shrugged.

“I’d still get a free ice-cream. Besides, you never know,” he said. “If you’re with the right person at the right time…”

He looked at Andrew, who suddenly felt hot and cold all over as if he’d accidentally eaten some of last week’s overzealous batch of Fever Fudge. He took an ill-advisedly big bite of his Butterbeer ice-cream and gave himself brain freeze and a mouthful of sticky toffee locking his teeth together.

Neil took a deep breath and said: “Can I kiss you?”

Andrew stood frozen in the middle of the street, with ice-cream melting down his hand and toffee between his teeth and chocolate frogs hopping around in his stomach in a wild frenzy. He worked his jaw until it finally popped free and swallowed the toffee down with a gulp.

“I killed a man,” he blurted out, though it came out more like a question than a reminder. Neil licked a trickle of sorbet from his cone and shrugged.

“It was self-defence.”

“Expelliarmus is self-defence. A Stunner is self-defence.”

“You were attacked,” Neil said calmly. “If someone attacks you, it’s not your responsibility to stop and figure out the path of least harm to your attacker. They forfeit their right not to be hurt by attacking you.”

Andrew looked down at the remains of his ice-cream and saw green light, whizzing past the side of his face to hit Drake square in the chest. Felt the unbearable weight of his lifeless body slumping on top of him, the slick smear of blood between his fingers. Aaron’s deathly pale face.

The even uglier truth was this: Andrew hadn’t defended himself at all.

“Andrew?”

“You still want to kiss me,” Andrew said, vanishing the rest of his cone and the mess on his trembling hands.

“Yes,” Neil said simply.

“Okay.”

“Okay,” Neil echoed weakly, stepping closer. “Now?”

Andrew caught him by the lapel of his jacket, rubbing the smooth leather between his fingertips. They were standing toe to toe now, the tips of their boots touching, and Andrew could see the little creases in the corners of Neil’s eyes and the freckles on his nose and the way his ears were slowly turning pink.

“Yes,” Andrew said, “now.”

Neil breathed a little hitching sigh as he leaned in, like he’d been waiting forever, and Andrew could relate. Neil’s mouth was cold from the ice-cream and he tasted like ginger, and some of the tongue-tingling charm must have still been there because Andrew felt tingly all over the moment their tongues brushed tentatively against each other. He pulled back a bit to recover, placing tiny, impatient kisses along Neil’s lovely chapped lips and into the dimples either side of his mouth, tracing his bottom lip with his thumb until he shivered. Then both of his hands found their way into Neil’s hair and Neil grabbed on to Andrew’s sleeve, rocking slightly on his feet from the force of their next kiss. Andrew pulled back again, this time to walk Neil backwards in the direction of a small alley, where he pressed him up against the rough stone wall and kissed him some more.

He returned to the shop late, with kiss-stung lips and hair pulled every which way and a promise from Neil to return around closing time so they could get curry and maybe, possibly spend the night together. Bee had Flooed back to Hogwarts after breakfast and Aaron was going home to Katelyn, so they would have Andrew’s place to themselves if Neil wanted to come upstairs after dinner.

_If_.

“Is that a hickey?” Robin greeted him cheerfully on her way out the door for her overdue lunch break. The bell above the door wolf-whistled and Andrew glared at it, wondering if he shouldn’t just shut it up with a silencing charm.

Aaron’s reaction contained a lot more expletives and threats to hide a disembowelling curse in Andrew’s hot chocolate if he hurt Neil.

“Aren’t you supposed to shovel talk him, not me?” Andrew asked, picking up a pile of shrinking socks that someone had thrown on the floor.

“I’ll give both of you a fucking shovel talk, just watch me,” Aaron grumbled fondly. “Took you fucking long enough, you pathetic shrivelfig.”

There was a deafening bang in the fireworks section and they played a brief round of Stone, Cloak, Wand to determine who had to go and deal with it. The scent of smoke lingered even after Andrew had employed several air-freshening charms, and they were busy with customers for most of the afternoon, too busy for Andrew to think too much about his impending date with Neil. When the door opened just after closing time and the bell merely stayed silent, Andrew looked up and abruptly felt like his stomach had shrunk like one of the prank socks he was sorting.

Neil was wearing tight black jeans and a silky grey bomber jacket, and he’d clearly used a good amount of Sleekeazy’s hair potion on his hair, making Andrew’s fingers itch to mess it up again in the best possible way.

“Like it?” Neil asked with a sly little grin. “Kevin and Allison took me shopping.”

Andrew reached out to run his fingers over the soft material of his jacket. He lifted one side to see what was underneath and was pleased to find one of Neil’s old Muggle band t-shirts, worn and faded from washing.

Aaron cleared his throat loudly.

“No undressing him in the shop,” he warned. “Neil, can you help me in the back for a moment?”

Neil smirked at Andrew and sauntered off obediently to be shovel-talked, Andrew assumed. Aaron, however, stayed behind long enough to point at the stairs that led up to Andrew’s flat.

“Go,” he said, “I’ll finish up here. You smell like fireworks and there’s fake blood all over your robes.”

Andrew looked down at himself and realised that Aaron was right. He was sweaty and stained, and if Neil had taken the time to clean up for their date then Andrew probably should, too.

When he came back downstairs, dressed and ready, Aaron was gone and Neil was sitting cross-legged on the floor chatting to the Pygmy Puffs. They were humming and squeaking back at him and Andrew had a feeling Neil would be coming back soon to buy one for himself as well.

“Oh,” Neil said when he saw him, licking his lips into a round O shape. “Wow. I didn’t know you owned any colours outside of the black range.”

He looked slightly dazed, and Andrew felt a tiny ball of smugness nestle down in his chest. He’d gone with an admittedly dark, fitted pair of jeans and a mint green cashmere turtleneck that Nicky had brought him back from one of his Gringotts business trips. Andrew had never worn it before, but judging by Neil’s reaction, he would be wearing it again in the future.

They went to a small curry place just outside of Diagon Alley in the Muggle part of London, where they sat outside on the steps as they waited for their food and Neil linked their fingers with a sheepish grin. Andrew cast a surreptitious warming charm at their food and they found a small park to sit and eat while the sunlight smouldered and curled like an autumn leaf. Neil told him about the time Kevin and Wymack had taken him to see the Quidditch World Cup with them, assuring him Kevin had definitely cried when the Irish team had won.

“Did I ever tell you that he’s dating the Harpies’ captain, Thea Muldani? She’s built like the Whomping Willow and could totally crush him with her thighs, but for some bizarre reason she’s decided she likes him. He’s bringing her to the Leaky for the pub quiz on Tuesday, which means I can bring you, because I don’t wanna be the third wheel. Kevin gets really competitive, we could team up against them.”

“Are you asking me on a date where we collectively crush Kevin’s hopes and dreams?” Andrew asked, raising an eyebrow.

“If you put it that way…” Neil grinned. “Will you come?”

“Depends.”

“On what?”

“If your inner Auror can stomach bribing me.”

“Oh, it’s like that, is it?” Neil teased, twining their fingers together again. “What’s your price, then?”

Andrew pretended to think.

“A kiss,” he decided at last. “And a hot chocolate.”

“And then you’ll do the pub quiz with me?”

“Yes,” Andrew sighed, “I’ll do the stupid pub quiz with you.”

“In that case,” Neil said, “I’m not above bribery at all.”

They walked back to the shop a considerable amount of time later, carrying their hot chocolates and discussing whether or not that had counted as one long continuous kiss or many separate ones. It was dark now, and the hushed light of the street lamps caressed Neil’s face like a lover. Andrew led him upstairs by his hand and felt disoriented and lightheaded as he stepped into his living room. Just this morning he’d had tea in the bay window, not knowing that in less than twenty-four hours he’d be kissing Neil Josten.

“This okay?” Neil murmured against his mouth. He tasted like peppermint and chocolate, but it turned out the flavour was a lot more bearable when licked off Neil’s pliant lips.

Who would have thought.

Andrew made a noise that sounded vaguely like a “yes” and snuck his fingers under Neil’s jacket, revelling in his body heat. They nearly fell over as they both tried to get their shoes off, and some of the urgency broke. Andrew poked his wand at the fireplace and one of the lamps, then sat down on the sofa and gestured for Neil to join him.

“This is nice,” Neil said, curling up carefully against Andrew’s side. “That Plucky Pumpkin sorbet really did me a solid, I give that five out of five stars.”

Something swooped and tickled in Andrew’s stomach and he pulled Neil closer against him.

“Why?” he murmured into Neil’s hair, inhaling his outdoorsy scent.

“You like me,” Neil sighed, with wonder in his voice. “I didn’t know. I wasn’t sure if you’d say yes.”

“Yes,” Andrew said simply, tucking a kiss into the wild riot of curls on Neil’s head. Even Sleekeazy’s hadn’t been able to contain them for long, and Andrew’s fingers had happily done the rest.

“I’d been thinking about kissing you for a while,” Neil admitted, then he turned coy as he added: “And not just your mouth.”

“Oh?” Andrew murmured, toying with a strand of hair. Neil’s ears were pink again, but he continued valiantly.

“Yeah. Like for example, I thought about kissing your hand.” He lifted Andrew’s hand up to his mouth and started to press small, round kisses to his knuckles, then flipped it over and kissed his palm.

“What else?” Andrew asked hoarsely.

“Well,” Neil said, “your neck.”

Andrew shivered and nodded, startling when Neil pulled down his collar and let his lips brush over the sensitive skin exposed underneath. Neil took his time exploring, humming in approval every time he coaxed a reaction out of Andrew, and his hands never strayed elsewhere while he was occupied with his neck. It was exquisite and excruciating, and Andrew had to pull him back up to his mouth when it all got too much to bear.

“Want me to go on?” Neil murmured.

“I want,” Andrew hummed against his mouth, “to blow you.”

“Oh,” Neil huffed. “Yeah, that works too.”

Andrew kissed him again, then tumbled them both down onto the rug in front of the fireplace and arranged Neil underneath him, kneeling between his legs. He looked kiss-rumpled and bright-eyed, breathless and delicious, and Andrew ran his hands over his toned thighs and swallowed thickly.

“Yeah?” he checked again, and Neil bit his lip and nodded, helping him shimmy down the tight jeans until they pooled around his ankles. Andrew permitted himself another moment just to look at him, then he bent down to taste him and swallow him down, a moan humming in his throat and his hands hooked under Neil’s knees, and Neil gasped sweetly and held onto the tassels of the rug with both hands like he was afraid of being taken away from Andrew’s mouth.

When he came, Andrew left a tiny kiss on his hip and held him through it, lapping up the little sounds he made. If someone had served him a scoop of Felix Felicis ice-cream right now, he wouldn’t have felt any difference; he was floating, he was content. Neil sighed as Andrew’s quiet cleaning charm worked its magic on him and turned on his side, nestling against Andrew’s chest.

“Mm, that was… yeah. Do you want me to…”

“No,” Andrew told him. “Shh.”

“Don’t shush me,” Neil mumbled sleepily.

“Shh,” Andrew said again, just to contrary. Neil retaliated with a fond smile and reached out to stroke the side of Andrew’s face.

“You’re amazing.”

“I’m a killer.”

“I suppose I probably shouldn’t say this as an Auror, but those two things aren’t always mutually exclusive.”

Andrew kissed the words right back into his mouth and pulled him close, heart thrilling in his chest when Neil let him cup a hand around his bare butt cheek and hold him. After a while Andrew remembered that he had to feed the fish and Neil complained about his other butt cheek getting cold, so Andrew picked him up and deposited him on the couch with a blanket while he fed the fish and made tea.

When he came back, Neil was soundly asleep on his sofa, naked from the waist down, firelight gently stroking his face.

*

“Andrew, I need your wand for a moment.”

“Use your own.”

Aaron glared at him and Andrew looked back unfazed.

“I’ll tell Neil how long you’ve been pining over him,” Aaron threatened. Andrew’s eyebrow twitched in irritation, but before he could come up with an equally devastating threat, the nuisance in question had popped up behind Aaron.

“Tell me what now?”

Aaron opened his mouth to ruin Andrew’s life and Andrew threw his wand at him, hitting him square on the nose. It shut him up though, and he quickly shuffled off to fix some sort of mess in the window display before Andrew changed his mind.

“Why does he need your wand, did he lose his?” Neil asked. “And do you actually have the same wands?”

“He’s being an idiot,” Andrew answered, “and no, we don’t, but it’s easier to use each other’s than someone else’s.”

“Interesting,” Neil said, munching on his cheese and pickle sandwich. It was a slow Monday morning and Neil had managed to ditch Kevin in the Ministry archives and Floo over for his lunch break. “So how long _have_ you been pining for me?”

He hopped up onto the counter, dangling his legs and sipping at his tea. Andrew ignored his question, spinning lazy circles on his stool behind the till, and stole a handful of salt and vinegar crisps from him in passing.

“Aaron!” Neil yelled. “How long’s he been pining for me?”

Aaron’s hand emerged from an avalanche of striped crepe paper and gave him the finger. At least his brother could be trusted to keep a secret until he needed it as blackmail material. Neil laughed and held his crisps out of reach of Andrew’s thieving fingers.

“Get your own, I’m not sharing.”

They had a little wrestle over the crisp bag that would have ended in Neil toppling off the table and spilling the crisps on the floor if Aaron hadn’t intervened and caught them in time. He claimed the spoils as his prize and tossed Andrew’s wand back to him, looking dusty and dishevelled as he looked around for his abandoned cup of tea.

“Andrew says you’re being an idiot about your wand,” Neil said to him. “What’s up with that?”

Aaron sighed and looked down at Andrew, who was still spinning slowly on his stool.

“Maybe we should tell him,” Aaron muttered.

“No,” Andrew said.

“He’s your boyfriend,” Aaron pointed out, wedging his foot under the stool to stop it from spinning. “He needs to know. I told Katelyn, too.”

“He is also an Auror, in case you had forgotten.”

“Yeah, and he could’ve arrested us several times over the past year alone, but he hasn’t, because he likes you,” Aaron snorted.

“I’m so intrigued right now,” Neil informed them, smoothly swapping his empty mug for Andrew’s half-full one. Andrew did the same with Aaron’s, passing the empty mug down the line.

Aaron kept looking at Andrew. Andrew sighed.

“He’s scared that he’s lost his wand’s allegiance because he cast a curse that goes against the oath he will have to swear once he enters Healer training, but he’s too chickenshit to test this theory.”

“That’s dumb,” Neil said. “Just test it. Come on, do it now and get it over with.”

Aaron glared at him, but Andrew had already slipped his wand out of his robes and held it out for him.

“It’s either that or get a new wand.”

“Fine,” Aaron gritted out. He stared down at his wand with a mix of revulsion and apprehension, then clenched his fingers around the handle and flicked it at Neil, who parried so quickly that the rush of spells exchanged made Andrew’s hair stand on end.

Aaron spluttered at the tiny bat wings growing from his nostrils and Neil laughed, removing them with a swish of his wand.

“Sorry, Auror reflexes,” he grinned. “But hey, the good news is, your wand’s still working. What was the curse you cast?”

Aaron sneezed and rubbed at his de-winged nose. Then he looked Neil dead in the eyes, said, “Avada Kedavra,” and walked off with a dramatic flounce of his robes, the crisp bag tucked safely into his pocket.

“Well, that was in poor taste,” Neil snorted. When Andrew didn’t say anything, he frowned and glanced between the twins. “Wait, don’t tell me he was serious about that.”

Andrew shrugged and resumed spinning on his chair.

“No,” Neil said, “shit, fuck, no. Andrew, no.”

“Can’t do Healer training with a criminal record,” Andrew said casually. “He’s starting next summer. It’s why he retook his NEWTs and all.”

“Andrew,” Neil hissed. “Tell me you didn’t confess to a murder you didn’t commit just so your brother could go to Healer training.”

Andrew stopped spinning and stacked the three empty tea cups on top of each other.

“If he hadn’t killed Drake,” he said slowly, “Drake would have killed me.”

“Fucking hell,” Neil whispered, still looking furious. “Fucking _hell_ , Andrew. You should have told me. Fuck.”

Andrew gathered up the mugs and left him to stew in his shock for a bit, feeling like the stolen crisps were rebelling in his stomach. He rinsed out the mugs, but all he could see was the blinding flash of green light in front of his eyes.

A hand gently pried the last mug from his white-knuckled grip and set it on the draining board. Neil picked up a towel and motioned for Andrew to hold out his dripping hands, carefully wiping the suds from them.

“What about you?” he murmured sadly. “What about your criminal record?”

“I don’t care.”

“I wish you did,” Neil said. “But if this is what you want…”

“It is.”

Neil nodded, pursing his lips, and put the tea towel down.

“Andrew Minyard,” he said, “you are the bravest man I’ve ever known. And I really want to kiss you right now.”

“What’s stopping you?” Andrew asked, and got shoved against the sink and kissed silly for his trouble.

There were worse punishments, he supposed.

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos and comments appreciated! :)
> 
> I'm on [Tumblr](https://annawrites.tumblr.com/), come hang out if you like my stuff!


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